Having an automatic garage door opener is really convenient! Being able to get your door open and closed at a push of a button is so nice, up until the opener isn’t working anymore. IF you have a power outage, and you don’t have a battery backup, your door won’t open! This is a problem if you need to go to work or the grocery store, or even if you just want to leave your house for some nice leisure time. What if you get home after a long day to find your power out, or that you lost your garage door remote! Knowing how to open your garage door manually is very important since your garage door opener may stop working when you least expect it.
Disconnect the Opener
First thing first! Make sure that your opener is unplugged. Especially if your power is out, you want to avoid damaging your opener from a power surge once if comes back on. Of course, the best wat to avoid this is to disconnect your opener from the power source altogether. The power cord is located just above and behind the opener motor itself. It should be plugged into the ceiling. Just unplug it!
Disengage
The second step in opening your garage door manually is to disengage the opener from the door. From the inside of your garage, locate the emergency release handle and cord. The handle is usually red and hanging from the end of a short rope or cord. Grab the handle and pull the cord down until you hear a click. If the handle is too difficult to pull, the door may not be closed all the way. You can try to push the door down all the way if the cord is too hard to pull.
Manually Open The Door
Now that the opener is unplugged and disengaged you can easily lift your door. As long as your springs are both intact then the door should be pretty easy to lift. Really, the springs do most of the heavy lifting for you so all you have to do is provide the motion and the initial momentum to get the door to open or close. From the outside, just press your hands onto the door panel and push up. From the inside of the door you can grab onto one of the inside rails and lift that way, or use the handle if you have one. IF you have decorative handles or hardware on the outside of the door, make sure not to use them to lift! They aren’t installed as a useable handle, just as a pretty decoration. If the handle accidentally gets ripped out of the door it will cause irreversible damage to the panel, and it would have to be replaced.
Reconnecting the Door
Reconnecting your door is just as easy as disconnecting it. Close your door fully, and grab the cord again. Pull the handle forward towards the opening to press down the spring on the trolly until you hear a click. the trolley should be reengaged on the rail. Next, you can plug the opener back in! Your door should be working right as rain again.